Editors-in-Chief

Jiahai Lu, PhD

Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China

Dr. Lu has a multidisciplinary educational background in public health, epidemiology, microbiology, vaccinology, pathogenic biology and veterinary medicine, etc. Dr. Lu's research interests include One Health (foodborne diseases and antibiotic resistance), epidemiological assessment, vaccine development, and prevention of parasitic diseases (e.g. taeniasis) and zoonotic diseases (e.g. SARS-CoV-2, SARS, dengue fever, avian influenza, rabies, and brucellosis), prevention and control in the field of infectious disease. Dr. Lu is an advocate and practitioner of One Health in China and a key member of the International One Health Committee. He established the first One Health Research Center in China and collaborated with more than a dozen foreign universities to establish an international One Health research platform. Since 2003, Dr. Lu has been dedicated to advocating and promoting the establishment of One Health related disciplines in China by organizing One Health forums, conferences, training courses and developing teaching materials at home and abroad. 

Susan Christina Welburn, PhD

University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK

Her research over the past 30 years has focused on the interactions between parasites and their vectors and hosts that lead to transmission of human sleeping sickness. This has involved a dissection of the mechanisms of innate resistance of vectors to parasite infections and the complex interactions between host, vector and parasite that result in parasite differentiation, disease transmission and epidemiology and control. Research has encompassed research ranging from ‘grass-roots’ fieldwork in Africa to laboratory-based dissection of the problems at the gene level. Research has resulted in 248 published works including 200 original research papers, 35 peer refereed reviews and 13 book chapters arising from £40 million in research support. Her work has been cited over 9 500 times and my H-index is 56. Most recently, her research is focused on maternal transmission of Human African Trypanosomiaisis (HAT). HAT is hailed as being on the road to elimination, but this ignores the pattern of generational epidemics of gHAT, five of which have occurred in the past century.

Jun Yang

Hainan Medical University, Haikou, China

Secretary of the Communist Party Committee of Hainan Medical University, Master of Public Administration, Director of the Key Laboratory of Tropical Translational Medicine of the Ministry of Education, Dean of the Hainan Academy of Tropical Medicine, Vice President of the Hainan Academy of Chinese Engineering S&T Strategy for Development, and Chairman of the "Belt and Road" Tropical Medicine Alliance.  He has also held the positions of Deputy Director of the Hainan Provincial Department of Health (now Health Commission of Hainan Province), Deputy Director of the Hainan Provincial Health and Family Planning Commission (now Health Commission of Hainan Province), Director of the Hainan Provincial Health Reform Office, Deputy Secretary of the Communist Party Committee of Hainan Medical University, and Dean of Hainan Medical University. He is the author of Towards One Health-A new choice for healthy Hainan amid building a free trade port. Research interests include: public health, social medicine.

Deputy Editors-in-Chief

Dirk Engels, MD, PhD

Former Director, Control of Neglected Tropical Diseases, World Health Organization, Geneva, Switzerland

Joined WHO in Geneva after more than 16 years of field experience. Countries and field of work: Zambia (1981-1982: clinical tropical medicine, public health, training); Zimbabwe (1982-1986: clinical tropical medicine, public health, management of health services); Burundi (1986-1995: tropical disease control - schistosomiasis and intestinal parasite infections, field research, management); Rwanda (1996: epidemiology, public health); Senegal (1997-1998: public health, field research, project management & coordination). Since employment in WHO (1998-2017): vast experience in management and organization of tropical disease prevention, control and elimination in all WHO regions, including involvement in parasitic disease control in China since 1999.

Yongning Wu, MD, PhD

China National Center for Food Safety Risk Assessment, Beijing, China

Prof. Yongning Wu is the Chief Scientist of China National Food Safety Risk Assessment Committee, Director of NHC Key Laboratory of Food Safety Risk Assessment, Head of WHO Collaborating Center of Food Contamination Monitoring (China) and the fellow of International Academy of Food Science and Technology. He graduated from Nanjing Medical College in 1983, and then from Chinese Academy of Preventive Medicine for PhD degree in Nutrition and Food Safety in 1997. Dr. Wu serviced as several members of the Food Safety Committee: e. g., internationally, WHO Technical Advisory Group- Food Safety, FAO/WHO Joint Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA), and nationally, Scientific Committee of Food Safety Commission of the State Council of PR China, Scientific Committee of Food Safety for Hong Kong Special Government of PR China. As the Director of Food Contaminate Subcommittee of the China Reviewing Committee on National Food Safety Standards and the Head of Chinese Delegation of Codex Committee on Contaminants in Food, he is involved in drafting the food safety standards for food contaminants, chaired draft working group on Codex maximum limit of inorganic arsenic in rice internationally and China National Standard. As the Chair of Panel on Selecting List of Non-Food Ingredients Might Illegally Added in Food, and member of Food Ingredients International Adulterants Expert Panel, he got Award for Outstanding Contribution to USP Standard. He is member of several journals' Editorial Advisory Board for food and environment science, as well as preventive medicine and has published 500 SCI papers, with H-index 53.

Guojing Yang, PhD

Hainan Medical University, Haikou, China

Full Professor at Hainan Medical University and the Editor-in-Chief of Acta Tropica. She obtained Medical Doctor title in 1996 from Tongji Medical University. In 2001, she gained her master degree in Pathogenic Biology. She obtained her PhD of Epidemiology and Public health in 2006 from Basel University. She then did around 2 years post-doctoral fellowship in Charles Darwin University and the University of Adelaide, Australia, working on mosquito population dynamics modeling. She joined the unit of Biostatistics, Swiss TPH in April 2014 and later in the Unit of Infectious Disease Modeling, in July 2017. She has been working on several malaria projects funded by Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, namely “Target Product Profile development of malaria intervention tools” as well as “Malaria intervention strategy portfolio analysis. She has strong experiences on both infectious disease modelling and practical field work. She is engaged in tropical diseases prevention and control in mainland China for decades, such as schistosomiasis and malaria. 

Advisory Council

Junshi Chen, MD

China National Center for Food Safety Risk Assessment, Beijing, China

Academician of Chinese Academy of Engineering

Dr. Junshi Chen graduated from the Department of Public Health, Beijing Medical College in 1956 and has been engaged in nutrition and food safety research for more than 50 years at the Institute of Nutrition and Food Safety, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (the former Chinese Academy of Preventive Medicine), Beijing. Since 2011, he took the position of Senior Research Professor at the China National Center for Food Safety Risk Assessment. Dr. Chen's research interests include: Food safety risk assessment & risk communication; Food toxicology; Epidemiological studies on diet, nutrition and chronic diseases; Food fortification; and chronic diseases health management and Exercise is Medicine.  Recently, he has been appointed as the Chief Scientist, the 2nd China National Food Safety Standard Reviewing Committee; Chair, Advisory Committee, the 2nd China National Food Safety Risk Assessment Expert Committee. His other social responsibilities include: Deputy-chair, Expert Committee, Food Safety Committee of China State Council; President, Shanghai JS Life Sciences Institute (SJLSI); Honorary President, Chinese Society of Toxicology.

Fu Gao, PhD

Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, China

Academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences

Professor Fu Gao is the Director-General, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention; a Professor in the Institute of Microbiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences; President of the Chinese Society of Biotechnology; and President of the Asian Federation of Biotechnology (AFOB). Dr. Gao obtained his PhD degree from Oxford University, UK, and did his postdoc work in both Oxford University and Harvard University, with a brief stay in Calgary University. His research interests include enveloped viruses and molecular immunology. His group research is mainly focused on the enveloped virus entry and release, especially influenza virus interspecies transmission (host jump), structure-based drug-design, and structural immunology. He is also interested in virus ecology, especially the relationship between influenza virus and migratory birds or live poultry markets and the bat-derived virus ecology and molecular biology. Dr. Gao has published more than 450 refereed papers and 10 books or book chapters, and he has applied for and obtained more than 25 UK, US, and Chinese patents. His research has recently expanded to public health policy and global health strategy. 

Gretchen Kalonji, PhD

Sichuan University – the Hong Kong Polytechnic University Institute of Disaster Management and Reconstruction, Chengdu, China

Gretchen Kalonji currently serves as the Dean of the Sichuan University–the Hong Kong Polytechnic University Institute of Disaster Management and Reconstruction (IDMR). IDMR was created after the Wenchuan Earthquake of May 2008. IDMR focusses on interdisciplinary research and education on disaster-related challenges, bringing together the health sciences, natural science and engineering, social science and policy, and emergency management communities on new integrated efforts.  Prior to joining Sichuan University, Kalonji served as the Assistant Director General of Natural Sciences and UNESCO, from 2010–2014; as the Director of International Strategy Development for the 10 campus University of California System from 2005–2010; as Kyocera Professor of Materials Science at the University of Washington from 1990–2005; and as Assistant and Associate Professor of Materials Science at MIT from 1982–1990. Professor Kalonji’s primary current goal is to promote new models of international collaboration in science and engineering, focussing on the critical roles of the universities and higher education systems. 

W. Ian Lipkin, MD

Columbia University, New York, USA

Dr. Lipkin has over 30 years of experience in diagnostics, microbial discovery and outbreak response. He has mentored and trained over 30 students and post-doctoral fellows and led a workforce of over 65 principal investigators, post-doctoral fellows and research and support staff with expertise in sample and database management, bioinformatics, neurology-biostatistics, diagnostics, molecular biology, experimental pathology, serology, culture, animal models, and staged strategies for efficient pathogen discovery and proof of causation. Dr. Lipkin was the first to use purely molecular methods to identify infectious agents. In 1999, he identified West Nile virus as the cause of encephalitis in North America. He developed MassTag PCR and Greenechip technology, two multiplex assays that have been used to identify and characterize more than 400 viruses, and was the first to use high throughput sequencing for pathogen discovery. In 2003, Dr. Lipkin established the Norwegian Autism Birth Cohort (ABC), the largest prospective birth cohort devoted to investigating gene-environment-timing interactions and biomarker discovery.

Heinz Mehlhorn, Prof

Heinrich-Heine-Universität, Düsseldorf, Germany

Member of the German Academy of Science   

Prof. Heinz Mehlhorn studied Biology, German and Chemistry at the University of Bonn and graduated in 1969. In 1971, he obtained a doctorate under Prof. Gerhard Piekarski in the field of Biology/Parasitology about the life cycle and the battle against the chicken parasite Eimeria maxima. In 1972, he worked as an assistant at Universites in France and the US. In 1974, he was offered a Chair at the University of Dusseldorf and being the assistant of Werner Peters he qualified in 1975 as a university lecturer on "East coast fever at cattle". In 1977, he was appointed professor at the zoological Institute II Dusseldorf and became a member of the scientific council. In 1983, he took the Chair for Special Zoology and Parasitology at the Ruhr-University Bochum. In 1987, he taught as a Guest-Professor in Japan. He returned to Dusseldorf in 1995 to become head of department of Zoology II at the Heinrich-Heine-University. Heinz Mehlhorn is world president of the parasitology associations and editor of the journal Parasitology Research. His main fields of expertise are the research on the microstructure of parasitic organisms and the development of medicine against parasites. He wrote 15 books in four languages, 170 articles and contributions in other publications in this field and developed 20 patents for new medicine against parasites. In 2001, he received a vocation to the North Rhine-Westphalian Academy of Science and Art.

Xu Tang, PhD

Fudan University, Shanghai, China

Dr. Xu Tang, obtained his PhD in meteorology and graduated from School of Physics, Peking University in July 2005, is now a Professor of Fudan Development Institute (FDDI) and Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences/Institute of Atmospheric Sciences (AOS/IAS) and the Executive Director of the Integrated Research on Disaster Risk (IRDR-ISC/UNDRR) International Centre of Excellence (ICoE) for Risk Interconnectivity and Governance on Weather/Climate Extremes Impact and Public Health (RIG-WECEIPHE) at Fudan University (FDU-IRDR-ICoE-RIG-WECEIPHE). He also serves as the Senior Scientific Advisor of the International Programme Office (IPO), IRDR, jointly established by ISC/UNDRR. He is the member of Alliance on Water and Disaster Management under the leadership of UN High Level Experts and Leaders Panel (AoA/UN-HELP) since May 2021. He served as the leader of EU-JRC review team of the chapter 3 of the publication titled: “Science for DRM 2020: Acting today, protecting tomorrow” in January 2019 to June 2021. He was the executive head to organize the Pujiang Innovation Forum 2021 on Climate Change and One Health, which was held in Shanghai on 6 June 2021. He was the Chair of the 1st Scientific Steering Committee of Shanghai Key Lab on Health and Meteorology in November 2012 to December 2015.

Jianguo Xu, MD 

Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, China

Academician of Chinese Academy of Engineering

Professor Xu, a microbiologist, has worked in the field of infection diseases over 40 years.  He was recently appointed as the Chief Expert of Epidemic Prevention and Control Advisory Board of The Olympic and Paralympic Winter Game Beijing 2022, and as Chairman of the National Expert Committee for Laboratory Biosafety of Microbial Pathogens by National Health Commission and Ministry of Agriculture of China since 2013. Professor Xu was elected as the President of Chinese Association of Microbiology for the term from November 2021 to November 2026, and was honored as one of the Ten Most Beloved Medical Doctors in 2020 in China by National Health Commission of China. He has served as  member of steering committee for Global Microbial Identifier.
Professor Xu has performed the animal reservoir study for SARS-CoV in 2004 as principle investigator. Recently, he has focused on the studying of microbiota in wild life on the Qinghai-Tibet region of China, and identified plenty new bacteria and virus, some of which are very likely to cause human infection. Based on above findings, he hypothesized the concept of reverse microbial etiology, to help the current public health response to “get ahead of the curve” of the emerging infectious. 

Editorial Board

Nasrin Aghamohammadi, PhD

Environmental and Public Health Department of Social and Preventive Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia 

Haroon Ahmed, PhD

Department of Biosciences, COMSATS University Islamabad, Park Road, Chakh Shahzad, Islamabad, Pakistan

Noori Al-Waili, MD, PhD

Al-Waili's Foundation for Science, New York, USA

Qijun Chen, PhD

Shenyang Agricultural University, Shenyang, China

Enoka Corea, PhD

Department of Microbiology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Colombo, Colombo, Sri Lanka

Guanghui Dong, PhD

School of Public Heallth, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China

Valentina Virginia Ebani, PhD

Department of Veterinary Science University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy

Feng Gao, PhD
Institute of Molecular and Medical Virology, Jinan University, Guangzhou, China

Huynh Giao, MD, PhD

Faculty of Public Health, University of Medicine and Pharmacy at Ho Chi Minh City, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Jinlin Huang, PhD

Faculty of Biosciences and Biotechnology, Yangzhou University, Yangzhou, China.

Rajesh Kumar Kesharwani, PhD

Department of Advanced Science &Technology, NIET, Nims University Rajasthan, Shobha Nagar, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India

Hongtao Lei, PhD

College of Food Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou, China

Xuewen Li, PhD

School of Public Health, Shandong University, Jinan, China

Yuchun Li, PhD

Hainan Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Haikou, China

Mingyuan Liu, PhD

Institute of Zoonosis, Jinlin University, Changchun, China

Tiefu Liu, PhD

Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center, Fudan University, Shanghai, China

Xiaobo Liu, PhD

National Institute for Communicable Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, China

Fangli Lv, PhD

Department of Human Parasitology, Key Laboratory of Tropical Disease Control, Ministry of Education, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China

Qingyue Meng, PhD

Peking University School of Public Health, Beijing, China

Fasina Folorunso Oludayo, PhD, DVM

University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa

Reda M.R. Ramzy, Sc.D

National Nutrition Institute, General Organization for Teaching Hospitals and Institutes, Cairo, Egypt

Barbara Angelika Rath, MD, PhD

University of Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, Besançon, France

Paola Roncada, PhD

University Magna Græcia of Catanzaro, Catanzaro, Italy

Yi Shi, PhD

Institute of Microbiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

Mohd. Raili Suhaili, PhD

SEGi University, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Jimin Sun, PhD

Zhejiang Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Zhejiang, China

Lu Wang, PhD

Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, China

Qiang Wei, PhD

National Pathogen Resource Center, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, China

Maxine Whittaker, PhD

College of Public Health, Medical & Vet Sciences, James Cook University, Queensland, Australia

Jun Yang, PhD

Environmental Epidemiology and Biostatistics Institute for Environmental and Climate Research, Jinan University, Guangzhou, China

Feifei Yin, PhD
Hainan Medical University—University of Hong Kong Joint Laboratory of Tropical Infectious Diseases, Haikou, China

Xiaoxv Yin, PhD

Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China

Siti Nursheena Mohd Zain, PhD

Institute of Biological Sciences, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Ling Zhang, PhD

Hainan University, Haikou, China

Longxian Zhang, PhD

College of Veterinary Medicine, Henan Agricultural University, Zhengzhou, China

Wenbao Zhang, PhD

The First Affiliated Hospital of Xinjiang Medical University, Urumqi, China

Jakob Zinsstag, PhD, DVM

Institute of Tropical Diseases and Public Health, Basel, Switzerland